Harriet Tubman

Araminta Ross was born into slavery in Dorchester County, Maryland, around 1822. As a child and teenager she endured brutal conditions, including a near-fatal head wound inflicted by an overseer -an injury that caused narcoleptic seizures for the rest of her life. She married a free Black man named John Tubman and took the name Harriet.

In 1849, fearing she would be sold, Harriet Tubman escaped to Philadelphia via the Underground Railroad -a network of safe houses and abolitionists who helped enslaved people reach freedom. She then returned south at least thirteen times, personally guiding approximately seventy enslaved people to freedom, including her own parents. She was never caught and never lost a 'passenger.'

During the Civil War, Tubman served the Union Army as a spy, scout, and nurse in South Carolina. In 1863 she became the first woman to lead an armed raid in American history, guiding Colonel James Montgomery and 150 Black soldiers up the Combahee River to liberate more than 700 enslaved people in a single night.

After the war Tubman settled in Auburn, New York, where she cared for elderly and indigent Black Americans and campaigned for women's suffrage until her death in 1913. Her face is slated to appear on the US $20 bill. She is one of the most celebrated figures in American history -known simply as 'Moses' to those she led to freedom.